My Black Friday

I'm usually the first person to see the glass half full, think positively, and all that jazz, even when wronged I forgive and forget very easily.  But lately I just can't snap out of this negative nelly stage I've been in, and even as things have been getting better I still take a turn to the dark side at the slightest frustration.  Yesterday I had my own Black Friday of sorts, despite more going right than it went wrong, I kept letting those little things get to me and the dark side won. 
Today I've decided I desperately need to add some whitener to this blackness I've been brewing in, so for every struggle I've been wanting to complain about I'm going to instead list the victories I've been blessed with, however small they may seem today, even one little ray of light seems bright when it shines into darkness.

Struggle                     Victory
~a friendship              ~several new friendships and friendships
                                    that have grown closer
~work                       ~I received a lot of thanks & recognition
                                    for my hard work this week, AND
                                    most of the extra work is now DONE!
~entrepreneurship      ~I've been able to have some great visits
                                   crafting in very small groups
~hubby's struggles      ~he initiated Church membership and
                                    wants to take the spiritual gifts course
                                    to learn where best to serve
~weight                     ~at least I've avoided the eggnog so far
~spend 'therapy'        ~'free' Christmas gift for Sean and I, a
                                    PS3 bought with airmiles!
~purpose                   ~if I quit busying myself looking for it
                                    maybe I'll actually notice when it
                                    appears

So good-bye Black Friday, I hope we don't see you again next year, or any year for that matter.

Top Ten Thursdays

I have a real sense of impatience these days, for EVERYTHING it seems! Waiting has never been my strong suit, but usually it's because I'm waiting for a trip, or a gift, or a gathering, all good stuff. These days I'm impatiently waiting to get beyond just surviving! Taking a break from goals couldn't have been timed better because I'm barely keeping up with life.
Therefore I'm impatient for:
1. Work to slow down! In addition to my usual duties, I've got to help prep for 2 external Health & Safety audits, 1 internal project management audit, and assist with part of a 2-person project that has turned into a 8-person project (we only have 12 in our office, only 2 in the appropriate dept.), and more!  Being barely able to breathe has been a far too common theme in my life lately, as I mentioned in early fall I burdened myself too much with personal goals, then with similar/other issues got hit with another anxiety attack (the kind where I literally have trouble breathing), and now I can't catch my breath at work either. I'd like just one area in my life that gives significant reprieve.
2. Emotional healing so I can get on with my life! I put all goal-oriented activities on hold in early fall, as already mentioned, but I'm getting really antsy over all the things I want to but 'can't' do.  It's obviously for the best, considering number 1, and considering the lack of breathing impairs energy too, I know it's for the best, but I feel my emotional healing is stunting my physical, spiritual and intellectual health.  Long term, I'm not very good at being content with complacency and couch-potato-ness.
3. As usual, answers to the question(s) of motherhood, as this seems to be the initial domino to fall and bringing others down with it.
4. The end of the recovery group I facilitate once per week.  Don't get me wrong, I love it, I feel like I'm meant to be there and that I'm getting so much out of it and am so blessed to see people healing, but I likely would waited until next session had I been asked just a month or two later.  Not only because I'm already exhausted and didn't need one more commitment, but it's also emotionally draining hearing about the difficult emotional injuries my new friends have had to recover from.  I love it but I'm looking forward to only 2 more weeks of it until the next session in spring, when hopefully I'll be much more emotionally able to handle it.
5. Kid therapy!!  If there is one thing that can heal AND distract, it's my nieces and nephews.  Winter is the time of year that holds sparsely sprinkled holidays that gather families and so seeing my precious little ones requires more effort, so I miss them even more this time of year.  I miss them even more since I was able to spend a whole week with them all in August, and I got addicted to each one of them even more, if that was possible.  I was looking through pictures of them the other day just to get a 'fix' and really need to make that effort to go see them before Christmas.
6. Puppy therapy!! Like pregnant bellies and babies seem to be everywhere when you want a baby, puppies are coming at me from all directions!  Two people I know have fostered/adopted rescued puppies recently and it's making me very impatient to find that perfect puppy for us to rescue!
7. Vacation therapy.  Considering I just had a vacation a month ago, this won't be happening until Christmas holidays, but I'm just about counting down the days!
8. A few gatherings that will provide some friend and family therapy before Christmas holidays :)
9. Since I haven't got ready access to my therapies, then distractions will have to do.  I'm impatient for Voyage of the Dawn Treader, coming in December! Waiting for that one for ages it feels!!
10. Waiting for the one night of the week that I have 4 hour long shows and 2 half hour shows that actually make it easy to be a couch-potato for once.....oh wait that's tonight!! :)

Top Ten Thursdays

I'm trying to psyche myself up for winter, especially now that it's November, an official winter month in Winterpeg (no matter what the solstice says).  I don't like being cold, layering clothes, heavy coats and boots and socks, sitting in cold vehicles waiting for both of us to warm-up, I could go on, but that would defeat the purpose of this post :)  Here are my top ten reasons I actually do love winter (in doses :)

1. Gingerbread and Eggnog lattes from Starbucks, yum!

2. Whatever it is in the cold air that makes sunrises and sunsets more amazingly breathtaking than any other time of year.

3. Hoarfrost, self explanatory

4. My new crocheted toque, handmade by my talented sister Tami, who is selling them by the way, hint hint ;) This isn't mine, this is hers, but it will be like this, only brown.

 5. Christmas parties with friends and co-workers

6. Hopefully getting in a photoshoot in some freshly fallen snow, underneath some picturesque crystallized snow, painted on some overhanging branches.

7. Making pretty Christmas cards and hanging pretty Christmas decorations

8. Christmas carols, fa lalala la

9. My office practically shuts down for a week over the holidays, another reason I love my job.

10. Christmas gatherings with familyOk, so apparently Christmas is one of the only reasons I can get through our long winters, but it is my fav holiday for a reason!

Top Ten Thursdays

So I'm doing fairly well on my break, most urges to do stuff I quell successfully :)  A few exceptions for some important things, but I'm happy to report a top ten list of things I am doing that are NOT goal oriented :)

1. A week long stay-cation that accomplished just about nothing.

2. Christmas shopping, gotta LOVE an excuse to go shopping!

3. Playing with mindless (but fun!) applications on my new iPhone.

4. Babysitting my teeniest nephew, yay!

5. Lots of time with friends during the whirlwind engagement/marriage of a friend....in last 2 months went to her social, shower, stagette, wedding, and then one last girl's night out with the gang while an out of town friend was still around from the festivities. Fun, fun, fun!!

6. A FABULOUS fall foto-shoot with a great photographer! Who can complain about a beautiful autumn day saunter, cuddlin' and smoochin' all the way and then some awesome pics to show for it!

7. Taking majestic sky photos that are just so awe-inspiring, I can't help myself, especially since my phone can take the pics and upload them to share every where I go!

8. Reading blogs, and resisting temptation to write them (until yesterday that was :)

9. Starting to plan a vacation to Las Vegas next year!

10. Creating the perfect butt groove on my couch ;)

Fill er' up!

The human body (including mind and soul) is a machine, operated by biological circuitry, vehicles, computers, coding, etc., therefore it stands to reason we need fuel.  It's a very common analogy that we fuel ourselves with food.  Well taking that analogy a step further, the human machine is slightly bovine in design, having in fact four fuel tanks.

There is the obvious aformentioned 'stomach tank', using food as fuel, and the health of our biological systems depends on the quality and quantity of that fuel. 

Then there is the 'purpose tank', where fuel is the opportunities to fullfill our purpose.  I discovered this one a few months ago in my spiritual gifts course, how success and serving can still feel us leaving empty if we're not using our God given skills and talents they way he designed us for.  Everything we do doesn't have to tie into our purpose, but if we are not utilizing them in some capacity it can be hard to feel like we're accomplishing much.

Then there is the 'love tank', where fuel is the love we receive from people.  This one I discovered years ago in a book called The Five Love Languages.  If you've never read it I highly recommend it as it helps discover the five different expressions of love and which one fills up your love tank the best, and of course then you can better understand other people's 'love fuel' as well. Like a vehicle, the engine is designed to work with a specific fuel, leaded, unleaded, diesel, well so is our love tank.  When we receive love fuel that doesn't meet our specs it can be only partially/temporarily useful or even completely ineffective. Having an empty love tank not only leads to trouble in a relationship but also to deeper emotional issues like anxiety or depression, not to mention you can't give love to others when your own tank is empty.  An empty love tank can also affect other areas of your life that are not love related, you can have a full 'purpose' bank and still feel unfulfilled.

Lastly there is the 'spiritual tank', also known as the God shaped hole in all of us.  Fuel, of course, is a closer relationship with God.  I think Philippians 4:8-9 sums it up:
"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you."  If God is the most important relationship and ultimate purpose in our life then I believe even running on empty in the other 3 tanks can't take away the peace he can give us.
Just as most of us wouldn't even consider letting our bodies run out of food fuel to the point of not being able to run our physical body, don't let yourself run out of the other fuels either.  It may not be as easy to tell we're on empty like a growling stomach but the emptiness will have it's own way of crying out for each tank. Let me tell you, it can get just as painful as a starving stomach.

We interrupt this regularly scheduled programming

I need to give myself a break, figuretively and literally. Ever since I've realized having children is not a likely future for us I have been a little obsessed with re-shaping my life and my purpose, and for some reason I have felt I needed to impliment every idea I ever had to fill the 'empty' life this would leave me with. I've created one list after another of things I feel I need/want to accomplish with this different future, a list of attributes/skills/characteristics I can shape in myself now that I won't have a life focused on raising children.
And I needed to act on it all NOW. Maybe so I wouldn't feel a void, maybe because I never was good at being idle, resting, relaxing.
I, being a natural born planner and scheduler, planned and scheduled all these new goals of mine with next to no wiggle room. I even put just about every goal in my Outlook calendar, reminders and all. I thought I accounted for the freedom to follow a God-led purpose, I realize now that embracing gifts he gave me didn't mean I had to use them all and so frequently. And I totally didn't account for 'life happens'.
And it did.
Life happened. What did I think I would do when work got crazy? How did I not see I had far too many priorities? Why didn't I slow down when people close to me started struggling? Or when I started struggling? My calendar reminders didn't stop appearing when those started. But amidst it all, I've continued to feel obligated to keep up with my schedule, after all, I have this person I'm trying to become, it was my choice to make these priorities, these goals. I would guiltally press 'Snooze' on all those reminders with good intentions of getting back to them all later, but they just piled up, overwhelming me even more.
I forgot to schedule time to.just.be.
So that's what I'm doing now. No more lists, no more goals, no more 'how am I doing' type blog entries. This is going to be a little weird for me because this is just part of who I am, my 'regularly scheduled programming' is self-improving, planning, preparing, purpose-driven, etc. I'm finally giving myself a break.
Don't know how long I'll need, but until I stop feeling so overwhelmed and unaccomplished, I'm on hiatus from all things goal-oriented.

Marrital Health

I once heard about a husband and wife who were in an accident together, recouperating in a hospital together in the same room. The wife finds herself getting better, choosing to be positive and overcome the situation, but her husband, disillusioned because of misfortune, stays ill. She doesn't want to be apart from him, she doesn't want to leave him behind, either in physical location or in health, so she allows herself to remain sick enough to stay in the hospital, with him.

It can be the same way with spiritual health. On more than one occasion I have seen a woman hold herself back spiritually because she doesn't want to leave her husband behind. She doesn't want to grow apart from him, be healthier than him, because of the seperation it creates between them. I have done it, and sometimes still do it. It just so happens it's a Biblical principal that men are to be the spiritual leaders in the household, is it no wonder women have this natural inclination to hold back their own spiritual growth so that their husbands can be that leader? I don't know why women think it's so offensive to be led, especially if that's who God has created men to be. He has created us to help men, not in a sub-servient way, but service is something he has made women good at because men aren't perfect, they need the kind of help God created women to be. They need our help to be leaders.

Sometimes I can begrudge the feeling I need to hold back my growth, but I'm beginning to learn, it's not holding myself back if I shift my focus on helping my husband grow instead. I am growing in God by leaps and bounds when my focus is on my husband's spirituality rather than my own.